ABOUT THIS COURSE

BENEFITS OF ATTENDING

• Gain strategies on how to plan the course and manage the content in a two-year course
• Learn what level of depth is appropriate
• Learn how to ensure students keep up with latest philosophical issues and how to apply them to their existing understanding
• Develop a confident understanding of the specifications, assessment and mark schemes to develop the skills student need
• Analyse a range of sample answers to understand the standard and how students can achieve it

Overview of A-Level Philosophy including challenges and what to expect from pupils

• Structure Teaching the AQA A Level Philosophy specification: how should the course be structured to best support students’ learning?
• Ensuring students and teachers hit the ground running in September – introducing the scheme of work and baseline assessment
• Recognising which areas will be the most challenging for you and how to address these issues
• Managing the content: planning and structuring; how can it fit into a two-year course? What level of depth is appropriate?
• Recognising which areas will be most challenging for you and how to address these issues
• Teaching Philosophy in an era of rapid change

Discussion: coffee break

How to Effectively Teach Epistemology

• Setting up the course: the how, what, and why of delivering a course in epistemology
• Appearance versus reality: do we perceive the world as it is? Some thoughts on perception
• Are we blank slates? The tabula rasa account of mind and its implications
• The tripartite analysis of knowledge: is knowledge justified, true belief, and if not, what?!
• Effective delivery: a nuts-and-bolts approach to epistemological pedagogy
• Schemes of work, booklets, and assessment: a comprehensive set of tools and materials to successfully introduce and deliver the course (and how to use them!)

Key ideas for teaching Moral Philosophy

• Why should I be moral? How to introduce a course on moral philosophy
• Happiness, duty, or virtue?
• Eating meat and eating people: some thoughts on practical ethics
• Do moral statements express truths? Metaethical questions and how to deal with them
• Morality: some thoughts on delivery
• Putting it all into practice: how to develop, maintain, and grow a course in moral philosophy

Lunch and informal discussion

The Exam – what is expected

• What the examiners are looking for and how to achieve it
• The importance of shorter (3, 5, 12) mark questions and how to use this to your advantage
• Talking the talk: the importance of terminology
• Essay writing and how to nail it: some thoughts on insight, initiative, and imagination
• Scaffolding, retrieval and how to embed these within a successful philosophy course

Discussion: afternoon tea

Planning and Structuring

• Milestones for success, what and how should students have mastered by the end of year 12
• Benchmark assessments: the planning and achievement of success
• The 50:50 approach: bridging the gap between GCSEs and higher education
• ‘5-minute marking’ and what it involves
• Some thoughts on assessment: how to halve marking load and double efficiency
• Effective feedback
• The scheme of work and how to use it efficiently